AlternativeRadio

The U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 is one of the great crimes in modern history. No one has been held to account. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, many more wounded and millions became refugees. Washington’s insane action unleashed a cascade of disasters across the Middle East from Syria to Libya and sparked the rise of jihadi groups. But Western intervention in the region has a long history. One can mention the 1916 Sykes-Picot agreement or the Balfour Declaration the following year and right down to the inheritor of European imperialism: the United States. Any country that says no to Washington’s diktats is threatened with “obliteration” as the current occupant of the White House warned Iran. The Empire’s subjects at home, the American people, are largely kept in the dark about what their country is doing abroad.

What’s the matter with Iowa is what’s the matter with large portions of the U.S. economy: extreme poverty in the presence of extreme wealth. In 1962, Michael Harrington wrote about it in his book The Other America. That America has not gone away. President Johnson’s war on poverty was not won. It was abandoned in the battlefields of Indochina. Today, the United Way estimates almost one in four Iowans live in poverty. And depending on how it is defined, the number of poor people nationwide range from 50 to 140 million. Persistent poverty from coast to coast and growing homelessness are systemic problems. What must be done? Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, in his historic Riverside Church speech said, “True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.”

Rape. From Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein to Wall Street financier Jeffrey Epstein to NFL star Antonio Brown, this ancient crime is in the news. The #MeToo movement has enabled many women to tell their stories for the first time. Who can forget Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony under oath at the Brett Kavanaugh hearings? Forever, women who have been raped have not been believed. That seems to be changing. In one case, which did attract some media attention, a California judge sentenced a Stanford University student found guilty of rape, for which the maximum sentence was 14 years, to six months. The student only served 3 months. An uproar ensued and the judge was recalled. The governor of the state signed a bill imposing mandatory minimum sentences in sexual assault cases. Much is to be done but the silence is broken. The conversations are happening.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has a contradictory record when it comes to the climate crisis. On one hand, he declared a “national climate emergency.” On the other hand, he plucked down more than $4 billion in public money to buy TMX, the Trans Mountain pipeline which will carry dirty tar sands oil. James Hansen, the renowned U.S. scientist warns, "Oil from tar sands makes sense only for a small number of people who are making a lot of money from it. It doesn't make sense for the rest of the people on the planet. We are getting close to the dangerous level of carbon in the atmosphere and if we add on to that unconventional fossil fuels,” i.e., tar sands oil, “which have a tremendous amount of carbon, then the climate problem becomes unsolvable." TMX is being resisted by various grassroots groups across Canada.

The India of its current prime minister Narender Modi is a far cry from the India of Gandhi and Nehru. Tolerance and secularism are being replaced by Hindutva, a Hindu nationalist ideology which seeks to establish Hindu dominance in a country where there are hundreds of millions of religious minorities. Modi is the head of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the BJP. It is the political arm of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the RSS. One scholar says the RSS "was explicitly influenced by European fascist movements, its leading politicians regularly praised Hitler and Mussolini.” India’s Muslim population of 200 million has been singled out by Modi. Islamophobia has resulted in murders, massacres, and lynchings of Muslims. There have been demonstrations all over India protesting Modi’s policies. Muslim majority Kashmir continues to remain under military rule.

Eduardo Galeano in his masterwork, The Open Veins of Latin America wrote that 500 years ago European settler colonialists came to this hemisphere and “sank their teeth” into the throats of Indian civilizations. You know the story. Genocide. Land was stolen. Broken promises and broken treaties. Survivors exiled to inhospitable reservations. In recent years indigenous people are organizing and asserting their rights. Standing Rock in North Dakota was a key moment where some 200 nations came together to resist the Keystone XL pipeline. New terms entered the lexicon of resistance such as water protectors and stewards of the land. Keystone and other struggles continue as does corporate capitalism’s monomaniacal drive for profits regardless of the cost to Mother Nature and indigenous peoples.  Chief Seattle once said, "The Earth does not belong to us; we belong to the Earth." Recorded at University of Montana

This recording, recently discovered in the piles at AR, features the great radical historian talking with students at UNM. He is asked about getting past the culture of denial of the powerful. Drawing on his vast knowledge of history he says, “It always takes time and persistence. Every movement looks like it is hopeless in the beginning. It seems people have no power. But then people took risks. The most important thing we can do is not to hold back. Resist authority. The more people speak out it encourages others to do the same. The American system is controlled but it has little openings. We have to take advantage of those openings.” He tells the students about his friend and fellow WWII vet, Kurt Vonnegut and a letter the New York Times refused to print. A perfect companion to the Back Seat Interviews I did with him that same day as we drove from Santa Fe to this event in Albuquerque and back. Recorded at the University of New Mexico.  

The stunningly beautiful land of Kashmir, nestled in the Himalayas, has seen much bloodshed and suffering. Over the decades the Indian state in attempts to stifle resistance to its rule in Kashmir has deployed hundreds of thousands of troops, imposed curfews, clampdowns and crackdowns. But nothing approaches the current situation. On August 5 the Hindu-nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi took unprecedented steps. Key provisions of the Indian Constitution dealing with Kashmir, articles 370 and 35A, have been revoked. The little autonomy Kashmir had is now evaporated. It is broken as a state and is under direct rule from New Delhi. No Kashmiri was consulted. It’s hard to imagine that the actions of the Modi government will quell the ongoing demands of Kashmiris for azaadi, freedom. Interviewed by David Barsamian.

The history of indigenous people is full of acts of resistance. One such dramatic action was the seizure of Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay by activists from the American Indian Movement. November marks the 50th anniversary of that event. More recently the blockade at Standing Rock in North Dakota galvanized indigenous communities to defend their land, water and sacred burial grounds. The Standing Rock resistance injected into public discourse such terms as water protectors and stewards of the land and an awareness that Native peoples have an expanded concept of kinship and family that includes Nature. Despite widespread opposition to the pipeline, Trump authorized its construction. La Lucha Sigue. The struggle for indigenous rights continues. Recorded at the University of Colorado at Denver.

Why are so many people all over the world out in the streets demanding change? What are the root causes of revolt? What about U.S. Syria policy and the betrayal of the Kurds? And BDS and Palestine? How do we overcome sectarian differences? Why are Americans so afraid? Eco-disaster and nuclear war threaten human existence. The former garners some attention because of the surge in youth-led activism but the latter is out of sight even though the dangers are escalating. The U.S. pulling out of the INF ballistic missile treaty and new Pentagon hypersonic weapons increase the possibility of catastrophe. What about impeachment and the 2020 election? These are just some of the topics Noam Chomsky talks about in this exclusive two-part program. 2CDs. Interviewed by David Barsamian. Recorded at the University of Arizona.